


The Magpie and the Falcon

by Mice



Series: Sea Change [11]
Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Character Study, M/M, Vera VanDooble (OC), outsider pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-18
Updated: 2020-09-18
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:08:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26527975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mice/pseuds/Mice
Summary: Flynn Fairwind and Mathias Shaw at dinner. There is an observer.
Relationships: Flynn Fairwind/Mathias Shaw
Series: Sea Change [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1875685
Comments: 32
Kudos: 61





	The Magpie and the Falcon

**Author's Note:**

> Because SifaShep and Toshimasa asked for a Vera VanDooble POV. And because I could. Thank you for the idea!

She sat in her usual spot in a corner of the Blue Recluse, quill in hand. They were on the upper balcony again, at a quiet, isolated table where the door and much of the main floor was visible. The Spymaster's choice, obviously.

Oh, Vera knew better than to write about them without approval these days. After the SI:7 threats, she'd backed off. A little gossip might be juicy, but it wasn't worth her life. On the other hand, she'd been given an obviously approved inside tip about King Anduin meeting Fairwind at the docks a while back and had been there with her S.E.L.F.I.E. camera to record the unprecedented incident, with Wrynn on Reverence, and the Spymaster looking stunning on one of those coal black SI:7 stallions that would make damned near any man look good.

And the social a week or so later? She'd been there, too, when Fairwind had been granted royal access that had half the House of Nobles in knots, dressed in a definitely-not-Admiralty uniform, with Shaw by his side in black and gold looking like a copper haired god. They were handsome together, she had to admit; good fantasy fuel, and both of them terribly photogenic.

They were a puzzle to her. The Kul Tiran, a tall man with a pretty face and a distinct lack of self-preservation instincts, should never have been good enough for a man like the King's Spymaster. Flynn Fairwind was a magpie. If he dressed better, she'd think him a peacock, but he wasn't. He wore the clothes of a working sailor -- heavy and salt-stained, practical. Light's sake, the only jewelry he seemed to have, aside from the little necklace he'd worn at the social that hadn't been seen since his recent return after reportedly being kidnapped by pirates, was a seashell on a cord. It was childlike and possibly superstitious. He chattered and bobbed and flitted and made courting noises at Shaw, preening and smiling a smile like the sparkle of the sun on the waves.

Mathias Shaw? If he were a bird, he'd be a falcon. A peregrine. He was fast and deadly, in dull colors; not some decorative thing for a nobleman's wrist but the hunter that struck down its prey between one breath and the next. Shaw had been lurking around the edges of Stormwind society for… Vera had no idea how long. He was shady and dangerous, but obviously a necessary tool of the state. No one with sense wanted to come to his attention. She'd learned that the hard way.

Not much was known about him. Oh, there were rumors. Light, the rumors about that man. She had no doubt a lot of them were true. There were a few particularly interesting ones about him and the former head of the Defias Brotherhood, but that was ancient history now. Until fairly recently Shaw himself might well have been just a rumor. And then the war ended and Fairwind came to the capitol, and suddenly they were everywhere. A man who'd never been seen out of armor, a permanent glower on his face, had changed almost overnight. They sat at their table on the balcony above, eyes only for each other, with Shaw in ordinary street clothing looking like nobody in particular. He dressed well, but not in a way that called attention. Even having dinner with his consort in the best restaurant in Stormwind, he was a shadow.

Fairwind smiled and flirted and laughed, and Shaw -- Shaw looked at him like he'd hung the moons. The man had a severe face with a precise, curled mustache that gave him the look of a martinet, but when he was with Fairwind, his entire aspect softened. Shaw smiled. His eyes lit. Everything about him glowed and there was no way to deny that the Spymaster was a man in love. 

They were as mismatched as a magpie and a falcon. Vera wondered if it would last. She had no idea what they saw in each other, but it obviously wasn't just physical. Fairwind certainly looked like he'd be fun in bed; he had the swagger of a confident man who knew how to please a partner. She still wondered if the rumors about Kul Tiran men were true, but she wasn't interested in personally finding out. One didn't mix with the rabble, after all, though the Admiralty officers might be a possibility. It would make a good story for her column, no doubt. 'Noble, self-sacrificing reporter goes under covers to bring you the truth.'

She tapped her quill against her lips, then dipped it and made a note.

Vera didn't bear Fairwind any particular ill will. He was interesting and, under other circumstances, would have been the sort to make a gossip columnist's career. Shaw, on the other hand, terrified her. He sat there with his lower-class lover, looking harmless and besotted but she was aware now of just how close she'd come to being found dead in a back alley somewhere, or possibly never being found at all. The threats hadn't been justified -- she'd only wanted something to entertain and cause a splash. Shaw had treated it like she'd spilled state secrets. 

Maybe they were. Maybe the falcon's personal life _was_ a state secret, even if he was wandering the streets carrying it like a banner. That, she could resent. The way Shaw was dangling things -- interesting things -- in front of everyone and then acting like such public acts were his personal, private property. Like people didn't have eyes and couldn't see it for themselves.

Finished with their dinner, they rose from the table. Fairwind had drunk only one mug of ale the entire time -- she'd been at her table since before they'd arrived -- but he moved with the slightly exaggerated, carefully choreographed inelegance of someone who'd drunk considerably more. She wondered why. Vera watched as they paid their bill and descended the stairs from the upper balcony. "...and _that,_ " Fairwind said, sliding an arm around Shaw's shoulders and bumping him playfully with one hip, "that was Marcus's fatal mistake. You should have seen him slither down the chair." He laughed, a little too bright and loud for a place like the Blue Recluse. "You'd have _loved_ it!"

Shaw gave him a fond but skeptical look and shook his head, chuckling. He put one hand into his pocket and slipped the other arm around Fairwind's waist in a gentle, affectionate arc, as though the big Kul Tiran were something fragile and too precious for words, as though he needed to be protected. She'd have thought it the other way around, looking at them, their relative height and bulk, with her assumption of who must be the stronger. As they passed through the main room, Shaw's green eyes found hers and she froze, feeling like something small and soft, prey that knows when the falcon has passed it by. He said nothing to her, and the glance lasted only a moment, but it left her chilled for the rest of the night.


End file.
